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Al-Akhbar is currently going through a transitional phase whereby the English website is available for Archival purposes only. All new content will be published in Arabic on the main website (www.al-akhbar.com).

The New York Times'ethically challenged Jerusalem Bureau Chief Ethan Bronner just won't quit. Today, in an article on the deteriorating relations between Israel and Turkey, Bronner cited a professor from Bar Ilan University named Efraim Inbar as "a specialist on Turkish politics."

We know quite a bit about Jeffrey Feltman. This Assistant Secretary of State for the Near East is the top official in the Obama administration in Middle East policy making. Of course, the significance of that position has declined sharply over the years with demise of the Arabists. The Israeli lobby and its affiliate organizations now decide on key issues affecting US policies in the Middle East. We know that Feltman is the anti-Arabist expert at the state department, politically and academically.

Yesterday I reported for the Columbia Journalism Review that New York Times Jerusalem Bureau Chief Ethan Bronner is on the speaker's bureau of Lone Star Communications, an Israeli public relations firm that pitches him stories. Bronner has provided extensive coverage to several of the firm's clients, including those involved in major political controversies.

Bob Turner, the Republican candidate campaigning to replace disgraced Democratic Rep. Anthony Weiner, picked up a crucial endorsement last week when Democratic Assemblyman Dov Hikind threw his support to him. Hikind is the former leader of the the Jewish Defense League (JDL), which the FBI lists as a terror organization. He was also a confidant of the fanatical Israeli settler leader Meir Kahane, who called for the "slaughter" of Palestinians.

It will be a definitive moment—or one of the definitive moments in the on-going history of the Egyptian uprising. People may be compelled to distinguish between the history before the storming of the Israeli embassy in Cairo and the history after it. The media of the Arab counter-revolution (primarily Saudi and Qatari) were very nervous and awkward in covering the story. It happened on a Friday when all the propaganda outlets should be focused exclusively on Syria (because the rest of the Arab world has become democratic, thanks to efforts of Gulf Cooperatoin Council (GCC) in the region.

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Last summer, the popularity of Turkey among Arabs reached a feverish peak. I was in Lebanon at the time and noticed that all demonstrations and rallies included displays of Turkish flags and giant pro-Turkish banners. The Turkish government was engaged in an intense propaganda effort to win favor among Arabs. The Turkish government (if not the people) have all but given up on acceptance by the European Union. I wrote back then against celebrating the Turkish government’s stance and warned that high Arab expectations would lead, yet again, to deep disappointment and dismay.

The "Periphery Doctrine" has been a cornerstone of Israel's strategic approach to the Middle East since the state's foundation. Devised by David Ben Gurion and Eliahu Sassoon, an Israeli Middle East expert who became Israel's first diplomatic representative in Turkey, the doctrine was based on maintaining alliances with non-Arab states and ethnic minorities in the region as a counterweight to pan-Arabism.

Someone should write a study of the portrayal of Mossad agents in US movies. Israel’s spy agency has a special place in US popular culture. It is rather bizarre, if you think about it. It is unimaginable that Turkish intelligence or Syrian intelligence would be heroically portrayed in American culture. But the centrality of Israel in the American imagination is unmatched. No country has achieved that status: not even the UK. No one speaks of a British lobby as they speak of the Israeli lobby.

The fake interview by Nicholas Blanford of a supposed Hezbollah member allegedly implicated in Hariri's killing was a journalistic scandal and a clear intelligence ploy. The interview published in Time Magazine presumably intended to bring the accused out—electronically speaking—in order to locate him. The story reveals a lot about the way in which the Western press operates. This is not the first time that coverage of the Middle East has been associated with scandals and propaganda. Western media have served as government tools since the US war on Iraq in 1990.